War in the Dirt

At the foot of Cyclone Hill, the drama played out. On one side, there were US soldiers; gritty, seasoned veterans of the second world war, and on the other side were cowboys, including Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, Hopalong Cassidy and Lash LaRue.

Six year-old Dickey carefully positioned his troops in straight lines, twisting each one firmly into the dirt so none would fall when the action began. His nemesis and next door neighbor, Ronny, placed his cowboys in Indian-fighting fashion, hiding them behind rocks, sticks and covered wagons.

“Ha! That’s not gonna work!” said Dickey. “My cannons and mortars will just blow ’em all to pieces!”

Ronny frowned. “No, they won’t!”

Dickey came back with, “Will, too!”

Ronny pulled a Civil War cannon from his Dale Evans lunch box and set it just inches from Dickey’s front line. “Ha-ha! How do you like that?”

Dickey hissed in anger, snatched a Saturn rocket from his Commando Cody lunchbox and laid it down, pointing directly at Ronny’s men.

“Hey, no fair!” protested Ronny. “That’s for takin’ monkeys into space!”

Dickey chortled, “I don’t care–this one’s gonna blow up on the launch pad and turn all your cowboys into french fries!”

Outrage! Indignation! Ronny pulled his ace in the hole. “Take this!” he cried, and slapped a Rifleman figurine down in the dirt. “He’ll shoot you a zillion times before you even know what happened!”

Dickey would have none of it. Reaching into a small, wadded-up paper bag, he pulled out the ultimate, supreme superhero of all time and thrust it before Ronny’s disbelieving eyes.

Ronny cringed and shielded his eyes. “No, not him!” 

Dickey delighted in Ronny’s agony and began singing, “I’ve got Superman, I’ve got Superman!”

“That’s it!” screamed Ronny. “I didn’t want to do it, but here it is!” From his sock, he pulled out a white chess knight, danced it provokingly in the air and sang, “Have gun will travel reads the card of a man… “

Slobbers flew from Dickey’s mouth as he spewed, “Noooooo!”

Ronny  laughed maniacally and continued the torture. “A knight without armor in a savage land… “

Tensions rose! Which side would do it? Who would prove man a failed species and open the floodgates of hell?

Dickey’s will to survive was strong, but his need for victory, stronger. He went for his rocket.

Ronny slapped it back with his Paladin chess piece and snarled, “Oh, no ya don’t!”

War was upon them! Blood would spill! Something blocked out the sun and cast a cruel shadow across the battlefield. Large, dark and foreboding, it was foreign… and frightening. With eyes big and jaws hanging, Ronny and Dickey looked at one another in horror, their respective hopes for victory suddenly sat upon and smothered by something much fouler and more evil than either could imagine.

“Geronimo!” cried the demon in pink boots as she sprang from the top of the storm shelter and landed directly in the middle of the battlefield. Wielding her long-legged Barbie like a sword, (The same doll that had been thrown in the trash at least three times) she decimated both forces with ease, then bent over, popped her bubblegum on Ronny’s nose while simultaneously blowing a fart in Dickey’s face. Cackling, “Ha-ha-ha!” she disappeared as quickly as she’d arrived.

Ronny fanned at the still-hovering dust cloud. Cough! Cough! “I hate that sister of yours.”

Dickey wiped brown spit from his mouth. “You should have to share a room with her.”